The following e-mail was received by the SHAND Mailing List on 16 September 2005; -

EMAIL 2005 - "Reverend George turned up in Forgue to look at the parish registers. He
religiously notes down entries from 1685 to 1698 and then gets to the 18th
century and suffers from information overload. Between 1701 and 1750 there are
527 baptisms of Shands in the whole of Scotland. In the same period in Forgue
Parish there are 110. 20% of all Shands born in the first half of the 18th
century are from Forgue. In all the OPRs, i.e. until 1855, the total of
Shands registered is 2652, in Forgue 238: 9% of the total. Over the same period
the the City of Aberdeen has 140, a random dozen of Forgue's neighbouring
parishes, including the towns of Turriff, Banff and Huntly produce an average of
33. Forgue is unquestionably the Home of the Shands".
Cryle Shand -(from Forgue)